Incandescence by Greg Egan Read Free Book Online

size of Roi's claws, and swarmed around the field on twelve busy legs. If the crops ever failed, Roi decided, she would have no qualms about eating them.
    Herders moved quietly among the flock, gently encouraging them to graze on the plants that people found least palatable. Roi had heard it claimed that the best herders controlled the susk by a process akin to recruitment. The murche ate what they pleased, but fortunately that included susk droppings.
    The ground here was tiered, rising up in small steps along countless jagged edges. To Roi it looked as if one large, continuous sheet of rock had come crashing down, with pieces breaking off the edge where it collided at an angle with whatever lay beneath it. The marks of this kind of violence could be found everywhere, but Roi had never seen the ground fall. If the Splinter really had been torn from a larger world — and if weight had always grown with distance — that world might have encompassed more powerful forces than any to be found in the present.
    If all of this was true, though, how had that mother world itself come to be? That was the trouble with any question about the history of things: how could you ever reach an end to it?
    The wind was brisk, but it blew from behind her as she climbed the steps of the field. The light from the rock ahead of her was a gentle glow; she was leaving the raw intensity of the garm-sharq edge behind.
    Roi had grown hungry, so she surveyed the area ahead of her for food, and finally settled on a solid patch of kahu to munch on. As she ate, two of the herders approached, unaccompanied by any susk.
    «To your life and strength,» each bid her encouragingly.
    «And yours.» Roi watched them warily as they ate beside her. If they wanted a new team-mate, she was outnumbered and surrounded, with nowhere to run.
    «What do you do?» one of the herders inquired.
    «I tend the crops at the edge.»
    «Valuable work.»
    «As is yours.»
    «Where are you headed?» the other asked.
    «To the Calm.»
    «That's a long journey.»
    Roi said, «I need to spend a few shifts seeing the world. It will make me a better worker.»
    Both herders chewed on this in silence for a while.
    «Travel safely,» said the first, moving away, firing a pellet of faeces deftly into a clump of weeds.
    «Thank you.»
    The second herder lingered. «Work is what makes better workers,» he opined.
    «Perhaps,» Roi replied.
    He rasped disapproval, but followed his team-mate.
    Upon leaving the field, Roi came across a series of chambers where teams worked to render susk carcasses into a variety of products. The soft skin that lined the internal cavities made an ideal surface on which to write and draw. The hard cuticle of the carapace was tough and durable, but when soaked in plant extracts it could be softened enough to work into different shapes. Some inner organs were edible, and Roi saw a couple of workers consuming them fresh from the carcass, but most were dissolved and processed into inks and paints, glues and resins, specialized plant foods, medicines, and an assortment of unappealing liquids and powders and gums whose purpose she didn't feel inclined to inquire about.
    The end result of Roi's labor spread naturally throughout the garmside as seeds on the wind, but these products required teams dedicated to their transport. As she passed the processing chambers, Roi saw couriers coming and going, traveling in twos or threes depending on the size of their load. Roi introduced herself to one pair, Zud and Sia, who were hauling a cart packed with diverse products that had been ordered by a depot almost halfway to the Calm.
    «How long will it take you to make the delivery?» Roi asked. Despite their burden, they were easily matching her pace as they ascended a steep tunnel.
    «The cargo will be there in two shifts,» Zud replied, «but we won't take it all the way ourselves. Our highest depot is less than one shift away; we only work between there and the edge.»
    «We're